{"id":76025,"date":"2026-01-20T20:46:15","date_gmt":"2026-01-20T11:46:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2026\/jan\/20\/kim-jong-un-fires-vice-premier-yang-sung-ho-goat-ox-cart"},"modified":"2026-01-20T20:46:15","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T11:46:15","slug":"kim-jong-un-fires-vice-premier-and-likens-him-to-a-goat-yoked-to-an-ox-cart","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/?p=76025","title":{"rendered":"Kim Jong-un fires vice-premier and likens him to \u2018a goat yoked to an ox cart\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>North Korean leader reportedly blames Yang Sung-ho for \u2018confusion\u2019 at factory project as major congress looms<\/p>\n<p>The North Korean leader, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/kim-jong-un\">Kim Jong-un<\/a>, has dismissed a vice-premier over troubles in a factory modernisation project, in an apparent move to tighten discipline among officials and push them to deliver greater results before a major political conference.<\/p>\n<p>The upcoming ruling Workers\u2019 party congress, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2021\/jan\/06\/north-korea-congress-kim-jong-un-economic-plan-failure-mistake-biden\">the first of its kind in five years<\/a>, is one of North Korea\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/gallery\/2021\/jan\/15\/kim-jong-un-puts-on-show-of-force-at-end-of-workers-party-congress-in-pictures\">biggest propaganda spectacles<\/a> and is intended to review past projects, establish new political and economic priorities and reshuffle officials.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2026\/jan\/20\/kim-jong-un-fires-vice-premier-yang-sung-ho-goat-ox-cart\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>North Korean leader reportedly blames Yang Sung-ho for \u2018confusion\u2019 at factory project as major congress loomsThe North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, has dismissed a vice-premier over troubles in a factory modernisation project, in an apparent move to tig&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":283,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sns_share_botton_hide":"","vkExUnit_sns_title":"","_vk_print_noindex":"","sitemap_hide":"","_veu_custom_css":"","veu_display_promotion_alert":"","vkexunit_cta_each_option":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[41,421,40,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-76025","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-asia-pacific","category-kim-jong-un","category-north-korea","category-world-news"],"veu_head_title_object":{"title":"","add_site_title":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76025","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/283"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=76025"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76025\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":76026,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76025\/revisions\/76026"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=76025"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=76025"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=76025"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}